More than three years later, the care she receives at Children’s makes her latest role
particularly meaningful. She has the lead in
Peter Pan, a fundraiser for the Pleasure Guild, which benefits the hospice and palliative
care program at Children’s. The annual benefit show will open Friday at the Palace Theatre.“

Everyone really wants to be here, because we know we’re doing it for a cause,” Emily said at a
recent rehearsal. Six months after symptoms started in her ankles, knees, wrists, fingers and neck,
Emily couldn’t stand the pain.

One evening, the joints around her ribs swelled, making breathing difficult. Her parents sought
medical care near their home in Westerville.

“Yeah, it was scary,” Emily said. “There’s no sucking it up for that.”

Although they were shocked to hear a diagnosis of arthritis, Emily and her parents say the
unknown was worse.

“It was, ‘OK, now we know what the problem is. We can figure out how to solve it,’ ” Emily
said.

Now a sophomore at Columbus Academy, Emily gives herself weekly injections, and said she is free
of pain and swelling. The only clue that something is amiss is the sound her knees make when she
bends them deeply.

The entire Cipriani family is creatively inclined. Rosemary, a violinist, has performed with the
Westerville and Newark-Granville symphonies.

Emily’s sister, Michaella, 17, a senior at Columbus Academy, is an accomplished singer who is
interested in pursuing a career in opera. Dad Larry downplays his talent but acknowledges having
played the trumpet once upon a time.

Emily began acting in fourth grade. In 2007, at age 10, she landed her first major role in the
Columbus Children’s Theatre production of
Junie B. Jonesand a LittleMonkey Business.

She has participated in more than 20 musicals or plays since then.

“It’s just fun to step into other people’s shoes and try and see things from different
perspectives,” she said.

Lisa Andres is directing
Peter Pan, the third time she has worked with Emily in that role.

“Emily is an amazing actress,” Andres said. “She’s just so natural and so real. I never thought
about casting her as Peter Pan, but she got up there and read (at auditions) and I said to my music
director, ‘She’s Peter Pan; she just is.’

“Whatever character she’s playing, she just becomes.”

Both Andres and Columbus Children’s Theatre Artistic Director William Goldsmith are impressed by
Emily’s improvisational ability.

“She’s mature beyond her years,” Goldsmith said. “When something happens onstage, she’ll be the
one to cover, even over the adults. You can always depend on Emily.” to take care of it.”

Andres recalled a time when Emily’s microphone battery pack came unclipped during a dance
number, “and she just reached back with one hand and tucked it in, smiling away the whole
time."

The actress is reluctant to talk about her arthritis.

“Emily is very low key,” said Gloria Higgins, her doctor at Children’s, whom she sees every few
months. “She doesn’t like to make a fuss.”

Emily’s prognosis is difficult to project, Higgins said. Because Emily has polyarticular
arthritis, which means multiple joints are affected, “she has a lower likelihood of it going away
completely,” Higgins said. “But we still would not want to say it could never happen.”

Higgins and Emily have developed a good relationship, and Higgins said she hopes to be able to
attend a performance of
Peter Pan.

Emily said she is grateful to Higgins — whom she calls, “really nice, like a super-intelligent
teddy bear” — and the hospital staff.

“They weren’t like, ‘OK, here’s your medicine, you look fine, go ahead and leave,’ ” Emily
said. “It was like, ‘How are you? How do you feel about this? What can we do to make this
better?'

“My goal was to get back into theater and be well enough that I can dance (without pain),” she
said, “and they’ve done a good job of making that happen.”